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MOGADISHU,
Somalia, June 05, 2009 - Fierce fighting between rival Islamist groups
killed at least 11 people Friday including an 8-year-old girl in a
botched land mine attack, witnesses said.
The child was killed in an explosion in the Somali capital Mogadishu
that had apparently intended to target African Union peacekeepers, her
uncle Ahmed Dahir Ugaas said.
Clashes Friday in the central Somalia village of Wabho, about 480
kilometers (300 miles) northeast of Mogadishu, pitted hardline Islamist
fighters against moderates backing President Sheik Sharif Sheik Ahmed,
said shop owner Abdullahi Salad Roble.
Roble said he saw the dead bodies of three civilians and seven
combatants after the hardline militiamen overran the village and
captured four pickup trucks fitted with heavy machine-guns abandoned by
the moderate Ahlu Sunna Waljama militiamen.
The two sides have fought for supremacy over central Somalia since late
2008 as the Islamist insurgency aimed at toppling the weak,
Western-backed government splintered.
Hardline Islamist insurgents last month launched a major offensive
against the Western-backed government's positions in Mogadishu and heavy
street battles killed close to 200 civilians.
The president vowed Thursday to fight the militants to the last man
because of the hardliners refusal to discuss peace.
Ahmed's government, which aims to rule Somalia with a moderate version
of Islam, controls only a few blocks of Mogadishu and a border town. His
allies control pockets of southern and central Somalia.
One of the main groups fighting Ahmed's government, al-Shabab, controls
large parts of southern Somalia. The U.S. State Department considers al-Shabab
a terrorist organization with links to al-Qaida. The group has denied
this.
Somalia has been mired in anarchy and chaos since 1991 when warlords
overthrew longtime dictator Mohamed Siad Barre.
Source: AP, June 05, 2009
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